VAGUENESS IN BRITISH POLITICAL INTERVIEWS
VAGUENESS IN BRITISH POLITICAL INTERVIEWS

Author(s): Jana Adámková
Subject(s): Language studies, Communication studies, Semantics, Politics and communication
Published by: Masarykova univerzita nakladatelství
Keywords: communication strategies; pragmatics; vague language; political discourse;
Summary/Abstract: The present paper aims to contribute to the field of communication and pragmatic studies. It attempts to examine and describe the way in which interviewers (IRs) and interviewees (IEs) in British (Br) political interviews (PIs) use vague language (VL). By analysing two interviews, first between Jeremy Paxman (JP) and Michael Howard (MH) and second between JP and Tony Blair (TB) the paper aims to explore what communicative strategies and effects both participating parties (IR and IEs) try to achieve by means of vague reference to numerical quantity and semantically empty nouns and phrases. The present paper is theoretically anchored mainly in Channell’s seminal work called Vague Language (1994).

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